jaybeezey:Animatronik: jaybeezey: HotIgneous Intruder: You call the cops, you're writing off the kid.

Kid was living in a shelter, he had already been written off.

He was 19 years old. Perhaps drugs were involved, given how angry he was over "cigarette money"

I'm sure they were, but family is family. If you bail on your kid, what's to keep him/her from bailing on you.

If the kid was truly to the point of danger to himself or others, he should have been in psychiatric care.

It is nearly impossible to get someone involuntarily committed unless they are well and truly batshiat crazy. We're talking "making racecars out of my own poop" crazy. Tons of very dangerous people don't meet that threshold.

impaler:After watching the dash cam of the kid careening off-road in the middle of campus, I have no issues with the cop's actions.

Neither did I, when this thread first showed up. The guy was a threat to those around him, did quite a bit of damage, and only luck prevented the injury or death of innocent folks. The cops did what they were supposed to do, and, in the end, it meant shooting the guy rather than giving him more chances to injure or kill someone.

As anyone who has ever read my rants regarding law enforcement, I'm not fond of what they've become - but they were doing their job, regrettable as it was, in this situation.

Wrong - a tragedy is not necessarily an injustice, or undeserved outcome. It is just a sad tale of human inevitability and failure.MacBeth was a rotten S.O.B who deserved every thing he got - his tale is still regarded as one of the great tragedies.Learn what words mean before you dispute other people's use of them.

FlaminFilly:We see police aiming Tasers after the kid was shot multiple times. Isn't the Taser the first weapon to use - not the last? On a progressive scale of force, the cops reversed the order of lethality... They blew up the village in order to electrocute it.

Tasers don't penetrate glass & sheet metal.

Regardless, I didn't see any tasers in that video, just what looked like a pistol with a light attached to the bottom of the muzzle.

Lyonid:Sin_City_Superhero: NEDM: Sin_City_Superhero: MycroftHolmes: It really bothers me that they claim he was unarmed. A vehicle is a weapon,.

That'd be like saying a rock is a weapon. A rock can certainly be used as a weapon, but so can anything. A gun is a weapon. A tank is a weapon. A Hellfire missile is a weapon.

That may be so, but a rock is definitely a weapon when you're using it to bash someone's skull in. Just like how a vehicle is a weapon when you repeatedly ram people's cars with it.

My point being that if you describe every person who has an item capable of being used as a weapon as "armed", then the term "unarmed" loses all meaning, as anything can be used as a weapon. The term "unarmed", in this context, is pointing out that he didn't possess a gun, or a knife, or a Hellfire missile.

"Point taken."

I'm pretty sure this is what you meant to say.

/no, really//especially since NEDM specified "when you're using it to" rather than "any item capable of"

The part I find objectionable is not the idea that he was armed with a car, but that the articles explicitly describe him as unarmed. This is disingenuous in the extreme. This would be like saying 'Unarmed man stabs wife with screwdriver' or 'unarmed man beats person to death with golf club'. This is bad, biased journalism.

Sry. Corrected:Link goes to the worst pop-up ridden site I have seen (that isn't PRON). Some garbage ad-spewer called "Flowplayer" not only had NO button to close it, but kept restarting when stopped only to pop out a second infernal pest of itself down the page. TO save anyone some pain who hasn't clicked yet, the cops chase the truck, truck comes to a stop, and you see nothing on camera.

Craptastic site needs to be shot by police. It killed my pop-up blocker. It is a threat to others. It needs to die.

Link goes to the worst pop-up ridden site I have seen (that isnt PRON). Some garbage ad-spewer called "Flowplayer" not only had button to close it, but kept restarting when stopped and then popped out a second infernal pest of itself down the page. So save anyone who clicked yet the pain, the cops chase the truck, truck comes to a stop, and you see nothing. Craptastic site needs to be shot by police.

It's like Godzilla. See, Godzilla was unarmed lost of the time, but the military used just about every weapon they had against him because of the amount of damage he was capable of. Yup, just like that.

impaler:After watching the dash cam of the kid careening off-road in the middle of campus, I have no issues with the cop's actions.

Neither did I, when this thread first showed up. The guy was a threat to those around him, did quite a bit of damage, and only luck prevented the injury or death of innocent folks. The cops did what they were supposed to do, and, in the end, it meant shooting the guy rather than giving him more chances to injure or kill someone.

As anyone who has ever read my rants regarding law enforcement knows, I'm not fond of what they've become - but they were doing their job, regrettable as it was, in this situation.

jaybeezey:Animatronik: jaybeezey: HotIgneous Intruder: You call the cops, you're writing off the kid.

Kid was living in a shelter, he had already been written off.

He was 19 years old. Perhaps drugs were involved, given how angry he was over "cigarette money"

I'm sure they were, but family is family. If you bail on your kid, what's to keep him/her from bailing on you.

If the kid was truly to the point of danger to himself or others, he should have been in psychiatric care.

Around here, you can't get someone committed for in-patient treatment until they have been through the police wringer. If you call the cops too quickly, the kid calms down, and the cops get mad at you for not being able to handle the problem. Wait too late, and someone is hurt or worse.

NarAnon is similar to Al-anon, and they support parents who feel compelled to call the cops on their drug addled loved ones. If you have never had to face someone you've loved turned into a completely violent stranger, you have no idea how hard it can be to apply tough love.

Sin_City_Superhero:NEDM: Sin_City_Superhero: MycroftHolmes: It really bothers me that they claim he was unarmed. A vehicle is a weapon,.

That'd be like saying a rock is a weapon. A rock can certainly be used as a weapon, but so can anything. A gun is a weapon. A tank is a weapon. A Hellfire missile is a weapon.

That may be so, but a rock is definitely a weapon when you're using it to bash someone's skull in. Just like how a vehicle is a weapon when you repeatedly ram people's cars with it.

My point being that if you describe every person who has an item capable of being used as a weapon as "armed", then the term "unarmed" loses all meaning, as anything can be used as a weapon. The term "unarmed", in this context, is pointing out that he didn't possess a gun, or a knife, or a Hellfire missile.

This happened in Iowa, so here's the law of that state, summarized: A dangerous weapon is an object that was designed primarily to inflict death or injury on a human being or animal (such as a knife, gun, razor) or any object that is actually used with the intent to inflict death or injury and capable of doing so. For example, a knife is a dangerous weapon, but a baseball bat could also be a dangerous weapon if used with the intention of causing injury.

So, if the guy was just driving his truck around, no, he's not armed with anything. If he made the conscious choice to use his truck as a weapon (or began to act in reckless and willful disregard to human life in his operation of the truck) , then he becomes armed.

I have a pen in my pocket. I am unarmed. I use my pen to stab you in the eyes. I am armed with a pen. Easy!

Fruit Chews:You people saying the father should not have called the police would be saying he's a moron for calling a therapist if he were to kill someone with his vehicle. First half of my life I would have never thought it was possible for cops to be called upon for (teenage) kids, I had a pretty calm life growing up.

Now, I understand. Therapists and phychiatric help is pertinent for proactive and for normal control issues, but in the issue of immediate danger to others/self? There is an obligation for restraint, even if the cops show up to restrain and then have an ambulance deliver the teen to a hospital for psychiatric care.

In my experience our local police have been stellar in terms of being part of the "village" to help families and teens with mental health issues. I pray for those communities who cannot say the same.

You raise an interesting point.

If the kid were mentally ill or on drugs then he is liable for anything the kid does, whether someone is hurt or not, if he fails to report his truck as stolenAnd we don't know if the father is to blame forthis guys mental state at all. Having known addicts, they can get into a lot of trouble all on their own.

J. Frank Parnell:Guy was obviously out of control, but a number of things make me think he might have had a psychopath for a dad. This would be the breaking point he was driven to for who knows how long. Doesn't justify anything he did, but it would help explain it.

The only way to know for sure is if i could meet the father and see if he's just feeling sorry for himself right now.

I agree that they kinda needed to shoot him after the whole thing was said and done, but really it was preventable. They shouldn't have engaged him on the chase in the first place. That's the reason so many cities have a "no pursuit" policy.

The guy was off his rocker, yes. But he wouldn't have been driving like that if there weren't sirens going behind him.

I wonder why the son ran; he escalated the situation. Not only that; but, he rammed a police car! I'd like to hear what the son's tox screen ends up being.

And I'm not seeing that the cop who shot the son had much of a choice. They probably could have backed off and picked the son up later; but, it didn't look like the son cared who he hurt.

I just can't imagine a situation where I'd be unwelcome to stay in my parents' home; I'm betting that the son was violent with family members. Also, I'd bet gold to lead that the son had a serious drug habit and stole things from the family home

Holy crap... when I first heard this story it didn't sound like the chase was all that serious. But then you watch the video, numerous red lights ran -- then he goes into a park/campus area with people walking around.

Add me to the list of the cops had no other choice. We know many officers and nearly all of them sincerely want to go through their careers firing 0 bullets off the practice range.

My brother was the worst kind of person when I was young--much too long to detail here. Sometimes a parent has to call for the police, and it's entirely up to the kid/young adult how far the use of force is escalated.

/Yes, there are bad cops in the world and they should be investigated and punished--this is not one of those cases.

That video was crazy. If that kid kept going, he probably would have somebody over. I'm not saying that shooting him was necessarily the best option, but given how recklessly he was driving I am not sure what else they could have done.